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I am not fond of ketchup that is mass produced via agribusiness and petrochemicals, nor do I approve of petroleum plastic containers. I attempted to educate my two girls that ketchup was "pesticide sugar sauce," so they would eat more wholesomely. Heinz foods is big business, and the late Senator Heinz was pro-highway construction (which we at the Alliance for a Paving Moratorium opposed). Teresa, in her philanthropic career after marrying Heinz, is said to have been on a board with Kenneth Lay. Well, in my past I shook hands with major oil industry CEOs and would greet them by their first names. We all have our past education. The question is what we do with it later. In February after I met Ms. Heinz Kerry and her son Andre Heinz in Tennessee, at a law school where I had spoken the day before, I wrote an essay on Heinz Kerry that was printed in such places as the Canadian business press, Pravda's Spanish edition, and elsewhere. She has since I met her had to keep too low a profile, unfortunately, for my preference. But I support her becoming the First Lady, and won't have to "hold my nose" while casting a Kerry vote. Perhaps I will be wrong, but we are all extra threatened by the prospect of more of Bush-Cheney and the rest of their cronies. A movement to support the Earth's health and bring about social justice must not rely on an election or elections in general. If people relentlessly agitated for change after electing John Kerry, and people aggressively addressed fundamental issues, Kerry may emerge as either an enabler or an obstacle for the changes needed. However, the bigger picture is, to me, a matter of (1) the collapsing global economy, probably due to oil peaking in world extraction and other reasons, and (2) the even more scary phenomenon of "Nature bats last": Earth's life support system is starting to collapse. These two overwhelming forces are like runaway freight trains that cannot be altered much by any social movement, strong as it may be, or any elected official. Any pro-NAFTA, maximum security-state leader may be eventually seen as a nail in the coffin both of our freedoms/rights and of the fast-deteriorating natural world. Still, one should vote for "Heinz Kerry for First Lady" by voting for Kerry-Edwards, for the reason that improvements in policy are possible in a Kerry Administration that are impossible with the Bushies. Trouble is, there isn't time now for little reforms, as the juggernaut of the waste economy goes on and population grows thanks to petroleum addiction. A meaningful Kerry presidency would feature the equivalent of perestroika (ecostroika?) and glasnost (openness and honesty about petroleum at least). I think it was great that John Kerry campaigned against the Vietnam War as a young man, and that is exactly the kind of background needed in the White House. I believe he would not be the imperialist aggressor, as have been so many presidents. His presidential campaign started long ago, and he has come to the point of trying to gain the trust of the military-minded chiefly as a tactic to get elected. Like Kerry's antiwar past, his wife Teresa Heinz Kerry is a clue to John Kerry's real self and probable leadership as the best improvement for a presidency this nation can hope for in these deadly, desperate times. Good luck Teresa and John; you seem to really sense we are all in the same boat.
***** To support the nonprofit Culture Change and its projects, make a donation ONLINE. Resistance here in the U.S. against the war machine, as urged in Jan Lundberg's Culture Change Letter #76. It's up to us -- the song, by Spring
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